It turns out the Barbara Ann Karmanos Cancer Institute and McLaren Health Care Corp. want to market their impending new affiliation in Oakland County after all.

The two organizations filed a lawsuit against Detroit Medical Center the day Karmanos announced on Oct. 30 it would sell its assets for an unspecified amount to Flint-based McLaren.

The lawsuit, said McLaren officials, only is intended to answer whether Karmanos can advertise and market its services with McLaren in Oakland County. It does not seek damages.

Karmanos faces restrictions because of a 2005 agreement in which the DMC sold its cancer business to Karmanos. That agreement prohibited the cancer institute, with limited exceptions, from marketing or advertising its services with anyone other than the DMC in Oakland, Wayne or Macomb counties.

McLaren did not disclose the lawsuit — despite being asked about litigation — in interviews for a Nov. 18 Crain's story in which it talked about its plans for marketing outside the tri-county metro Detroit area.

On Nov. 27, DMC filed a motion to dismiss McLaren's compliant for declaratory judgment. DMC said Karmanos is liable for breach of contract and McLaren for tortuous interference with its prior agreement with Karmanos.

Greg Lane

Oral arguments on DMC's motion to dismiss are scheduled for Dec. 18 before Judge Wendy Potts in Oakland County Circuit Court. Potts also is expected to hear oral arguments on the McLaren/Karmanos lawsuit on Jan. 7, said Greg Lane, McLaren's chief administrative officer.

DMC officials were unavailable for comment by deadline.

In its lawsuit, McLaren said it wants to use the Karmanos name on its cancer centers at McLaren Oakland hospital in Pontiac, McLaren Cancer Clarkston and other McLaren health care facilities in Oakland County.

But DMC said it sold Karmanos' DMC's cancer business in 2005 for the low price of $9.9 million because it included an exclusive affiliation in perpetuity. Karmanos had offered $45 million for the DMC cancer operations.

"The benefit of the DMC's bargain is lost if non-DMC hospitals could market the Karmanos brand, diluting the goodwill and value to the DMC of that brand," said DMC in its response. "The new McLaren/Karmanos agreement breaches the DMC/Karmanos agreements."

Lane said McLaren believes it has the right to jointly market services with Karmanos in Oakland County. He said the DMC-Karmanos agreement allows for a co-branding exception at McLaren Macomb in Mt. Clemens and an outpatient cancer center also located in Mt. Clemens.

"The DMC has no reasonable or legitimate business reason to withhold its consent," said the McLaren lawsuit, adding: "The affiliation agreement is a restrictive covenant that violates Michigan's Antitrust Reform Act and the state's common law."

DMC was acquired by Dallas-based for-profit Tenet Healthcare Corp. in June after Nashville, Tenn.-based Vanguard Health Systems Inc., another for-profit chain, took over DMC on Jan. 1, 2012.

McLaren is asking the court for a declaratory judgment that grants it the right to jointly advertise with Karmanos in Oakland County.

But DMC said the court should enforce the DMC-Karmanos agreement.

"(McLaren and Karmanos) know that there is intense competition among cancer care providers, both within and outside of Michigan, from small and large health care providers, including Beaumont, Henry Ford, St. John, Botsford, Oakwood, Trinity Health/Catholic Health East, the University of Michigan and McLaren," the DMC said.

"McLaren is free to compete, but not by interfering with the DMC's agreements and converting to its own benefit the DMC's exclusive affiliate and brand — Karmanos," DMC said.

Lane said the lawsuit to gain joint branding rights with Karmanos in Oakland County "is not a critical thing related to the sale. We are 110 percent comfortable doing this transaction. It is just whether the court will agree with us or not."